Review: Penance, by Paula Richey

What can I say about Penance that I haven't already said about the rest of Silver Empire's Heroes Unleashed universe?

Quite a bit, actually. Much to my surprise.

The Story.

The "Prime" (The HUU's version of someone with powers) in this case is Penance Copper. At 17, she's been on the streets for most of her life. She's been raised by a street thug named Acid her entire life. Then the day comes that Acid asks her to take out a local hero named Justice. 

That's the last straw.

Unfortunately, this last mission from Acid leads Penance in the middle of an interstellar invasion by Kail-- a supply sergeant from another planet. His men need food and they need water. And the nearest planet to raid? Earth. And they have a place full of food and water. It's called a football stadium, and there's a game on, so there are plenty of hostages. 

And Penance is the only one who can get inside.

Hilarity ensues.

This story was just so well told, I breeze through more than half of it in a single night. Good plotting, action, and character. It's all well put together. 

The Characters

Penance is interesting. Because she's the Artful Dodger with superpowers, working for Fagan-as-super-villain. She's a character that has to think about using her superpowers--like used her electromagnetic powers and abilities to copy anything with an RFID chip (electronic keys, alarm system codes), or her plasma abilities to cook microwave popcorn in her hand. Also, the ability to shock someone back to life, something I want more electricity-based heroes to do (I think Endgame may have been one of the few times someone tried it). Paula even highlights how Penance can have these powers without cooking herself.

She's also stronger than the average bear (a literal bear). And she's Southern...By the time we get a quarter of the way through the book, Penance sounds and looks like Rogue, with additional powers that feel like "What if Jubilee was useful."

And yet, Penance isn't so overpowered that she overcomes anything that gets in her away. At least four times in the book she gets her ass kicked fairly thoroughly--once by simple science.

With Kail, our alien, it's interesting that his story could be easily summed up as "the quartermaster needed some lousy supplies," but boy, does that spiral. Seeing things through his eyes tells the reader more about his planet, his culture, and him, more easily than a chapter-long data-dump on societies. And the culture clash is as effective as Crocodile Dundee, if sometimes less funny.

Not to mention that limiting the POV to these two main characters highlights just how much one knows about the other, that even the other isn't aware of about themselves....

Yes, I think that sentence made sense. Honest.

And I like that Kail, as supply sergeant, makes his own clothing. And bookshelves. 

And the nicest thing? Kail even thinks like an alien. 

The World Building

Separating out the world building from the characters and the story required a crowbar in this instance. There are no data dumps here. There are no exposition paragraphs. There isn't even a chapter where Kail regales Penance with the exact nature of their cultural and societal differences. 

And it's unnecessary. Paula Richey spent the entire book worldbuilding. It's shown in almost ever interaction between the two, and their actions.

If David Weber could do this in his novels, they'd be at least 20% shorter.

The impressive thing is that Penance created and explained an entire alien civilization with stopping to spell out how it worked. And it works like Ming the Merciless learned to make an entire generation put themselves in debt, and be in chains forever. I didn't know he was a Democrat. Paula does a great job of making and unrepentant SOB you just want to see have a stake rammed through his heart.

And, at the same time, Penance spells out a lot of life on the streets for Heroes Unleashed. Every time I expect them to go bigger, they manage to do a lot with very little. Paula manages to take one element and write a good chunk of the book around it.

There are also at least two threads that tie Penance back to the original Heroes Fall book. 

Not to mention that I enjoyed having the alien invasion spun by the Men in Black as "he's a new supervillain. Nothing to see here." Seriously, if John Ringo did the politics of superpowers, this would be the series he lifted it from.

Not to mention that Paula has a grasp of technology no one points out. For example "your invisibility suit is nice, but what happens if it's really dusty?"

What's the politics?

There is only one way there is a political angle to this novel. Penance is reading a Bible throughout, because she's trying to learn about this Jesus person. I think that along will turn off certain readers. And we all know some of them, don't we?

Imagine if "Christian Fiction" only started having conversations about Jesus at natural points in the story.... like if an alien asked questions.

TLDR

Penance was just plain fun. I can usually tell what writing tricks are executed when "This is the data dump. This is act one finale. This is how the slip in backstory." Not here. It's all smooth and effortless and makes writing look easy. Why couldn't I have written like this when I started.

And yes, this is labeled "YA." How? Why? Aside from the age of the characters, I can't really tell you. It's not like anything in the rest of the HUU has had egregious violence, or sex, or foul language. (And nothing has been as bad as the icicle in Die Hard 2, not even John Wick's pencil.) And, as one reviewer said of Narnia, "This is too good for children."

Anyway this book is fun, it's awesome, and you should buy it. Links are below.

Publisher link: https://silverempire.org/product/penance/ref/274
Amazon link: 

Review: Overlooked Again, by Jon Mollison

 The old poem goes

There was a man upon the stair

A little man who wasn't there

He wasn't there again today

Oh how I wish that he would go away.

He's back and he's armed in Overlooked Again

Yes, this is the return of superhero Joe Smith, Jon Mollison's contribution to Silver Empire's Heroes Unleashed series. And dang is it fun. His Phoenix Ring series may be the best part of the universe in a neck and neck race with Kai Wai Cheah's Hollow City thread... though that may be unfair, since Mollison and Cheah are the ones who I have read two books of (No, Cheah's next book isn't released yet. But I had early access. Heh heh heh). And at this time, there are two other authors who I haven't read yet.

In Overlook, Joe Smith, a prime with the power to be ignored, encountered the Phoenix Ring, a grand conspiracy that looks like if Dean Koontz designed the Illuminati,** and bringing in an element of The Man who was Thursday. But Joe also found a counter conspiracy. After crushing the ring in Serenity City, now, Joe has been quietly keeping the ring in its place -- in the graveyard. 

But like any good villain, the Phoenix Ring has its own counter move. Because they found not only one, but two people who can pierce Joe's powers, and hunt him down. So it's a good idea for Joe to leave town for a little bit.

Joe's new mission: go to Halo City (last seen in Cheah's Hollow City) and make certain that the Phoenix Ring can't rig an election for alderman.

But the Phoenix Ring hasn't gotten to where they are by lying down. They have all the forces of governments behind them. And Joe Smith is their primary target.

Overlooked Again is fun as much for what it does as what happens in the plot. The book is well written, obviously. As I said, I think there are a few references to The Man who was Thursday, some bad puns (The Phoenix Ring runs Firebird Industries? Ugh. How did I forget that from the first book?). 

And the villains. How could anyone forgot how absolutely evil these bastards are? They lack the mustache twirling of the most recent Dean Koontz novels, but they are no less pure evil. Imagine if the Chicago Machine was the tool of Satan... No jokes, please. I'm saving that for another novel I'm writing.

But what happens when a former sniper becomes the man who wasn't there? He becomes a ninja. No, I'm not really joking. You'll see him in action in the first chapter. Which starts out as very by the book, and ends in a tense, and interesting chase.

In the middle of all of that, Jon Mollison pulls off an excellent data dump that both recaps the last book, tells the reader what's been happening since then, and does it all without reducing a bit of tension. It's information discussion on par with David Weber (Or, see: David Weber orders a pizza)

Along the way, Jon has two interesting people after our hero. The first is a French hunter, the Owl, a prime who can hunt Joe, and fight him to a standstill. The other is ... well, you'll have to read it to get it, but it's a lead in to what Jon does with this book.

While I am not able to track what phases the Heroes Unleashed universe is in with this book (probably phase two), we have now entered the phase where there is overlap between the main heroes we're working with. It really begins to show off the shared universe all these players live in. No, I don't mean simply that Joe goes to the city created and written by Kai Wai Cheah, but this is also a world where the Atlantean (and Lovecraftian) magic of Richard Watts is an active threat.

And of course, they're all out to get Joe. They lead to moments where my only note was just "Aw f***"

The writing is also enjoyable. Little comments and phrases, like how "he could have completed the ensemble, but he would have stuck out like a disco ball in Church." Though I hear some megachurches already have those...

I also liked the very casual "You can't just murder your way out of this problem."

And everyone here is well written. The villains are colorful and three dimensional. The supporting cast beautifully compliments our hero. And the upper villains are pure bastards.

Anyway, it's all very well executed, and I look forward to reading the next one.

5/5. Buy it here from the Publisher (Amazon link forthcoming)

**Yes, I have read the Jane Hawk series, where he had something like the Illuminati. But this goes back much farther.

Review: in Death's Shadow

This is one of those books where I cannot tell you how it came to my consciousness. 


I recall getting a review copy. For all I know, Kal could have mentioned asking for reviewers in one of our groups and I just volunteered.

However I am glad that I got a chance to get this particular review copy, though I cannot tell you for the life of me how it came into my possession. 

This book has so many fun entertaining elements to it, it is hard to know where exactly to begin.

• You have Metallurgy on bullets that I have not seen since the first Monster Hunter novel. 
• It brings in Creative elements that would make Jim Butcher want to take notes. 
• And frankly I also believe that there is a Quantum Leap reference just thrown in for good measure. (When you have a entity that no one else can see except our protagonist and he is called Sam I try to remember back to Quantum Leap to remember which character was played by Dean Stockwell — Al or Sam.)

Welcome to In Death's Shadow.

Ari lives in the shadow of death.
Ari is a combat veteran who has chosen to leave the military behind and live a quiet, normal life.  He's got a few problems though.  For one thing, the cops think he's a serial killer.  For another, a vengeful politician has put Ari in his crosshairs.  To make matters worse, Ari has a guardian angel... and not just any angel, Ari's protector is the Angel of Death.  When his life is in danger, people start to die, and Ari's guardian can sometimes be indiscriminate whose life he takes when protecting him.

That's not even the worst problem.  Death wasn't assigned to him by mistake.  An ancient werewolf wants Ari dead and even with death on his side, Ari might not survive.

Ari needs to find a way to stay alive, to clear his name, and most importantly to get out from under the shadow of death and live a normal life... even if it kills him.

Yes, a reaper playing guardian angel. I appreciate how Kal has avoided making our hero utterly indestructible by giving him a guardian angel who is akin to a weapon of mass destruction. 

Also appreciated? The execution and showing us the point of view of how at this reaper operated within his rules and regulations. 

Overall the book is so much fun I didn't put it down from the moment I picked it up. Right now I am only waiting for book two to come out (and I suspect book 3) so I can just buy all of them in hardcopy and spread them among my friends and family.

Kal brings a lot of wonderful little touches to his writing style. He has one of the better opening lines I've seen since "the building was on fire and it was not my fault." The very off-hand casual easy descriptions and backstory feels effortless -- largely executed with nice sharp background notes that leave a nice little sting and then move on with the rest of the story, easily throwing them out... But boy, does the reader feel them. 

There is also a lot of very easy humor such as how Sam (our Guardian Reaper) chooses to protect our hero. Sometimes to laughable degree — that though Kal never resorts to a Rube Goldberg mechanic. In terms of little touches, there are lines like "I'd managed to avoid ruining this set of clothing with blood at least." 

As I said, it's the little things.

Due to the nature of the Guardian reaper, Sam's protection has led to him having more than a few run-ins with the police. 

Kal even manages to have to make use of the old canard 

"Do you have plans for the day?" "No, I can't make plans, then they can throw around words like premeditation." 

I've been waiting for someone to use that in a novel for years. He just slid it in like a nice stiletto and moved on.

And no, even though Sam is very thorough about his job, he never turns into a deus ex machina. Never. That's freaking impressive.

I even like the little bit about how Sam really enjoys he 24 hour news cycle as "like an athlete staying up on sports news". Also, Sam's commentary on CNN is beautiful.

Great one liners include

"Are demons common in Detroit?" "Clearly you haven't been to Detroit lately." 

"Angels are the police of the Supernatural world" "What does that make Sam?" "Designed sniper."

There are several elements that almost feel like nods to other genre novels. For example one could be forgiven for thinking that Harry dresden's werewolf / Terminator scene is slipped in this one, or having supernatural beasties encountered in Afghanistan feels a little bit like Monster Hunter. And again, little touches like casually mentioning a werewolf and "how thermite grenades work wonders." 

As I said above, some of the metallurgy is so good, I intend to steal a lot of it. Including silver and mercury arounds, as well as electrum.

We have great action, dark humor, easily executed backstory that is all relevant to the plot, along with some great world-building at a pace Mickey Spillane would have loved.

I will also admit to highly enjoying Kal's version of werewolf mythology and lore. He does some nice variations that I personally have never seen before. And he comes up with perfect reasons and rationale for werewolves to be 100% pure evil all the time. After all, one of the enemies is literally a soul sucking werewolf from Hell.

And these are some of the lesser problems our hero will have to deal with. Because on top of a wonderful first novel, Kal has effortlessly set up a sequel without any actual sequel baiting. There is no Empire Strikes Back level BS. There is no "to be continued." And there is only an ending that would have worked perfectly well with the final line of a comic book movie. I mean a good one.

Spriggs is such a good author that it was nearly halfway through the book before I realized how many tropes and cliches that Kal had made good use of without them feeling at all like cliches or tropes. Including: a dead fiance, memory loss before a certain age, et al. However it feels more like the sort of mash up that brought us something as brilliant as Jim butcher's Codex Alera novels. 

At the end, we even get a little of the "hero of the borrowed heart."

Anyway, 5/5. This book was excellent. I look forward to the next one. Hopefully, it comes out soon.

Review, Maxwell Cain: Burrito Avenger

This one was described as John Wick, but with a burrito (not a puppy).

An action novel for fans of John Wick, Demolition Man, or Die Hard.

Maxwell Cain, also known as “Bloody Rain Cain,” is a cop fed up with the murderous hooligans who control the streets of San Pajita, California.

After years of public service, Max is fired for executing too many dirtbags, and he seeks solace at his favorite taqueria. When his comfort burrito is sullied by the careless actions of brutal thugs, Max finally snaps. What begins as an argument over a ruined lunch quickly spirals into a hurricane of blood and revenge.

Max is joined in his fight by the gorgeous Kate Valentine, a baker with an itchy trigger finger. As the two rush into battle against an entire criminal organization, they are hunted by the relentless terror of the seedy underworld: Johnny Legion.

This book is designed to feel like watching a classic 80s or 90s American action flick.

Welcome to Maxwell Cain: Burrito Avenger.

This one isn't ... quite as insane as it first appears.

Kind of. Sorta. It's complicated.

To begin with, unlike the deep, complicated events and emotions behind "Puppy = killing spree," the burrito in this instance is less the puppy, and more the last straw. In a city that is as corrupt as Chicago, only with an extra layer of scum at the top, Pan Pajita's police force is so overwhelmed that the police "can't respond to every little shooting." But no one at the top minds, because the criminals pay "fines" (usually a portion of the take from the crimes) that goes into the private coffers of public officials.  Okay, fine. It could also be Dirty Harry's superiors in LA.

This one opens with one of the best opening lines since Jim Butcher's "The building was on fire and it wasn't my fault." Adam's is "Maxwell Cain had killed dozens of men. In fact, that was kind of the problem."

It even has a little setup tag that sounds like an 80's film trailer. You can just hear the narrator read "In a world where one man..." etc.

But after a day where Maxwell Cain (I'm sure that it's a coincidence that Max Caine sounds like Matt Payne, honest .... especially the parts that go into bullet time) kills six bank robbers, then is fired for it, all before lunch, he's pissed off and hangry (No, I didn't misspell it).

When some random gangbangers hipcheck Caine into spilling his burrito, he whips out the cheesey one liner ("maybe I'll be a teacher." The next chapter is called "Lesson Plan", and the joke concludes with "Class dismissed") and goes to beat up some thugs. When the thugs need to be put down, it turns out that they were off to pay a mafia bag man -- who still wants his payoff. That confrontation spirals into a war with an entire mafia family, who assume he's a hit man.

With a few breaks to pause for something strange, like character moments, this is basically a 250 page running shootout. The scene that best exemplifies this is where a gunship blasts a monorail train off the track, causing the car to land on top of a hotel roof, which eventually crashes through every floor to land into an electrified pool, into which Max Caine Sparta-kicks a thug while declaring "THIS! IS! SAN PANJITA!"

Did I mention that there's a bit of hat tipping in this book? I'm surprised that Max doesn't end up losing his shoes while walking through broken glass. There's every setpiece shootout ever scene in a film -- shooting up a mall, a hotel, a public art exhibit (the Pieta re-imagined with lizard people -- kill it with fire!), run and gun car chase, a hotel, a mobster's home, a train, "the docks," the standard warehouse, and a few other places thrown in. And he double-wields every chance he gets. We have Jackie Chan's baseball wielding thugs in suit and tie. He has John McClane's habit at yelling at gunmen (An RPG tears up the street, he yells, "Do you have any idea how much it costs to fix a pothole that big?"). At least one man killed during a poker game had aces and eights (subtle).

Did I mention that the mafia enforcer dresses in white and carries a golden desert eagle -- meaning that he's the man with the golden gun?

And like John Wick, Max Caine, cars are his only weakness -- getting hit with them. That, and the running gag that every time he sees a burrito and reaches for it, he summons more gunmen.

Then there's the new stuff -- like "gunfight selfies" (I can see that being a thing) a running gag of shopping while they work, and this is the first Catholic action hero I've seen since William F Buckley JR wrote spy thrillers.... and not written by me. Comparing someone's home to a serial killer den. And the prescient "City council declare it was unfair for cops to get protective gear when civilians don't, said we needed to even the odds."

Most of the combat is very well done and highly detailed. All the action is tightly paced. Though after a while, even Adam stops detailing the path of every bullet and discusses how everyone is just firing on automatic and spraying faceless gunmen with bullets. (If you ever wonder why I suck characters into melee combat a lot, this is why.) To be perfectly fair, Adam does try to describe every minion who lasts more than a few lines, though that's a lot of bald or bearded men after a while, and I wondered when there would be other descriptors used. Though that's probably just "one writer nitpicking."

And the one liners. Oy, the one liners. To fit in more one liners, Max Caine talks to himself. A lot.

Some examples?

After his lunch is ruined and one of the killers is run over: "Lunch hour traffic will really kill you."

"I'm the best cop in the department."
"You're the most violent cop in the department."
"That's what I said."

"I don't want water. I'm thirsty for blood."

While surrounded by gunmen: "Well, yippe ki yay."

This feels like a Dirty Harry movie starring Ahhnuld, meets Falling Down, but with John Wick level stunts.

Anyway, I fully recommend it in all of its utterly insane glory. Buy Maxwell Cain: Burrito Avenger right here.

And while you're at it, you can pick up one of my latest Saint Tommy novels.

Review: Psychic Undercover (with the Undead)

Ah, vampire romance novels. The cotton candy of the literary world. Even the more substantial ones are so light and fluffy, you could drop them in the ocean and they'd work as a life preserver. (Lynsay Sands, I'm looking at you. I like your stuff, but you need to invest a little more in plot.)

Luckily, Amie Gibbons' book Psychic Undercover (with the Undead) is more urban fantasy than vampire romance, so thankfully we have plot, we have character, we have a bit of a police procedural, and we have action.

The FBI's about to find out ghosts and vampires aren't the only things that go bump in the night...

Singers are a dime a dozen in Nashville, so despite her mama's urging, psychic Ariana Ryder's working her way towards a career in law enforcement at the FBI, one tray of fetched coffee at a time, instead. She's got an extremely handsome boss, a dancing partner among the lab techs, and a solid year as the team rookie under her belt...

Right until the director gives her a big break, working undercover as a singer at a club to investigate why it's being targeted by a serial killer. This might have worked better if the club didn’t happen to be a vampire nest.

Now, with the vampires' investigator, Quil, on the case, the sparks are flying and the jurisdictional battle isn't the only thing heating up as they race to solve the case before the killer strikes again!

So, Amie Gibbons is both an author and a lawyer -- but please don't hold that last part against her. Thankfully, unlike other lawyers like John Grisham or Scott Turow, she doesn't make a point of inflicting her law degree on the readership.

Like most UF, it's a first person narrator, and Ariana is well defined, and certainly a product of her environment. A Nashville girl with a mother who's a romance novelist and her father is a former marine and a politician. She's girly, and as professional as the plot allows ... read it, you'll understand. I especially liked that she has a fear of "being trapped. I get the same reaction when I'm lost or stuck in traffic" ... which apparently explains her driving. Heh. Short version, imagine Kristen Chenoweth as our protagonist.

For the record, I have to point out that the description above only spills the plot up to chapter 3. Which I appreciate. I've had some problems with other novels that spoil up to half way through the book.

The book has a good sense of pacing, as well as a sense of humor and world building. I like the sense of vampire society, as well as the fact that Gibbons have vampires who are still largely predators by nature. (While this does have a romantic male lead who is a vampire, it's pointed out more than a few times that he's very, very different from the rest of the vampire society -- even the people he's friends with or works with). I'd like more elaboration about the way vampires are developed, but that's for later books, I'm sure.

The portrayal of the feds in the book is far more fluid than I've come to expect from the FBI. For anyone who thinks the feds aren't this thoughtful, creative, or fluid in their thinking ... well, that's because this is a world without professional monster bounty hunters, and where the FBI must actually solve crimes and have a certain flexibility about them. All of the traditional FBI agents (rigid, glorified bureaucrats) have probably been eaten by this point in the timeline. Not to mention that the character arc in the first novel explains that yes, this FBI team is different than most, if only because they have to incorporate care and feeding of their pet psychic into their team. Gibbons takes pains to point out that yes, this is a strange group of Feds to start with. (Also, the NY stereotypes were a little grating after a while).  If you have a problem with the portrayal of the FBI, at least finished up to the end of Chapter 10. It's self explanatory.

One of my few quibbles with in the book is her superior officer. Not because of he character or his mentality -- he's the most like what one would expect from the FBI in this novel. I even like that he holds his private meetings in the bathroom (not the elevator?), or that he summons if you mention his name too often (why yes, I think he is related to Gibbs). And he will even defend his people against his superiors -- the only way they die is if he kills them. Except his name is Grant, and Ariana keeps calling him General... which strikes me as something I wouldn't want to do in the South to someone I liked. Seriously, you want him shot?

The other quibbles are minor. The narrator uses phrases that are jarring. I presume they're local. Also, have Spotify handy. There are multiple song references kicking around I've never heard of. There is also a reference to "Why don't they use silver bullets?" -- but if Larry Correia has taught me anything, silver is too hard to be a bullet, and it wouldn't rifle properly. But that's a narrator problem, not an author problem (again, our narrator is a rookie).

All in all, Psychic Undercover (with the Undead) was a solid book one, with a built-in book two, at once creating a continuing plot without anyone feeling cheated by this plot. It is definitely a five star book, without question -- especially if you're looking for something in the female led UR / PNR genre. She's better than most -- I'm looking at you Sookie and Anita. This may lean only slightly more PNR than UR, but it's serviceable as either. She's better than Lynsay Sands, as good as Kerrlyn Sparks, and more entertaining than the last five of Sherrilyn Kenyon's novels.

Click here to get Psychic Undercover (with the Undead).

Review: Somewhither, by John C Wright

Everyone knows the phrase "down the rabbit hole." It's an Alice in Wonderland reference, where the main character is in their normal, everyday life one moment, then in someplace utterly insane the next. Reality is utterly, totally, and completely different.

For John C. Wright's Somewhither, the rabbit hole wasn't good enough. No. We needed an inter-dimensional portal that opens up to an invading army, sucking our hero into a realm that makes Wonderland look positively friendly and harmless.

Ilya, as he has secretly dreamed, is called upon to save the mad scientist's beautiful daughter. With his squirrel gun, his grandfather's sword, and his father's crucifix, Ilya races to save the girl, and, incidentally, the world.

So it is, Ilya Muromets is a big, ugly, motherless boy who does not look like anyone else in his Oregon town. His father is often absent on mysterious Church missionary work that involves silver bullets, sacred lances, and black helicopters. One night, Professor Dreadful sends a warning to Ilya that his Many Worlds theory correct, but that his experiments have opened a door that should have remained closed, and his beautiful daughter, Penny, is in trouble.

The 2016 Dragon Award-winner for Best Science Fiction Novel, Somewhither is the first part of A Tale of the Unwithering Realm, a new science-fantasy series from science-fiction master John C. Wright. It is an adventure, it is a romance, and it is a coming-of-age story of a young man who is not a man, in a world that is only one among many. It is a tale of a greater and darker evil with longer reach than anything he could imagine, of pain beyond measure, and of the faith required to surmount all three. It is a story of inexorable destiny written in the stars and the stubborn courage that is required to defy it.

I loved this book. It was so delightfully insane, and so marvelously put together. I enjoyed it from the first page. Especially as our hero narrates that this was all for a girl named Penny Dreadful.

.... Yes. He went there. It doesn't even stop there. If you folks think my writing is proof that I'm a smartass, you have got to read Somewhither. And this is just page one. Which includes the line "If you blame the damsel in distress, you are not the hero."

The opening chapters may be a little slow to people who are not nerds. But you're reading a book that's one part scifi and one part fantasy. If you are not nerdy enough to enjoy Wright's conversation about the how's and why's (and why nots) of branching timelines and alternate universes, why are you even reading this review?

But this is John C. Wright. He can probably describe paint drying in an entertaining fashion. Especially when he describes one incident with the supercollider as "let's just say over a dozen scientists, staff members, and visitors were electrocuted, microwaved, and Hiroshima'd."

I told you he could make anything entertaining. There's even an entire conversation between Ilya and his father ... during which you realize that things aren't all that normal with this family ("Now Ilya, you've known that since you were twelve, when we taught you quantum mechanics." Huh?). The punchline of this conversation ends with one of the most awesome reveals that I've seen in a while, and more or less backhands Stephen Pinker into next Tuesday, casually and easily, in one paragraph.

And the lovely little dissertations along the way are charming, and so un-PC, it's delightful. There's a conversation on lovely damsels. Or getting two halves of the brain arguing with each other lest they gang up on the hero to stop him from heroics. (The note I made on points like this is "Remember when Peter David was funny? Pepperidge farm remembers.")

After Ilya falls into another world, and the plot gets off to a running start, one of the running gags throughout the novel involves language. Let's just say that I think that if John C. Wright wrote Lord of the Rings, he would have sentence diagrammed elvish.

Once we get to meet the villains, they are delightfully evil pricks. In a world where astrology is an accurate science, and fate is everything, even some of the men running the evil empire are trapped. It strikes me very much like the Persian empire -- "freedom" wasn't even a word in the language. It's not in this language, either. Neither is "right and wrong." Funny that. They are so unambiguously evil, even the narrator points out

"On principle, I was not helping any group that called itself The Darkest Tower against places called the Great Golden City and Land of Light. That was a no-brainer. I mean, get serious. Suppose you were from another world and came to ours circa 1940 and you saw an SS officer in his black uniform with the silver skulls on his collar, and he said he wanted to exterminate some folks called The Chosen People from some place called The Holy Land, who would you think the bad guy was?"

Despite how obviously evil the adversaries are, they are not shallow evil. There is a bit reminiscent of Sam and Frodo being Shanghaied by orcs -- Ilya is given a tour of The Tower by a creature that even Richard Sharpe would have identified as a Sergeant just by his banter. In it, we get a perfect picture of a Screwtape bureaucracy where Ilya concludes that the empire "is all full of bureaucrats and lawyers? This place is hell."

Also, there is a lot of casual bits of humor scattered throughout. Such as the misattributions ("There is an old saying: if you want peace, prepare for war. I think it is in the Bible or something."). And the little shots scattered throughout this novel are so much fun to behold. There's the "Professor Dreadful" referred to in the blurb, who is a "Harvard trained symbologist" (to which Ilya's father replies, "Amazing what they give degrees in these days.") And the Templars are the good guys. (Dan Brown felt that one,) The bad guys of the piece are from The Dark Tower. And all of the evil sorcerers carry golden compasses (snicker). Some of the warnings of prophecy are right out of Lovecraft. When Ilya hears that someone is a ringbearer, he says, "You mean like at a wedding? Or do you mean like Sam Gamgee carrying Albrecht's ring when it got too heavy for Tom Covenant?"

Even the casual comments about other timelines are entertaining ("Dude, my planet is run by Prussians .... You need paperwork to get permission to go to the outhouse.")

Then there's the bit that compared Fantasy Island to The Tempest. I feel like Wright has a lot of stuff in his head and it's all stacked on top of each other.

And I swear the entire building of the final team is a reference to the X-Men, only interesting and without the angst. (We have an unkillable killing Machine. A wind manipulator called a "Cloud Walker". A ninja. A Norse Shadow meets Moon Knight. The monster that chased Bugs Bunny. Captain Nemo. And at least one reference to Lady Hawk.) Though I'm relatively certain that Wright was going for a D&D campaign given how often he comments on character classes.

For the record, I feel I must note the sections that boil down to torture porn. If I didn't know better, I would swear that Wright was a fan of Hellraiser.

If I were to sum up this book in one phrase, it would be "Anime Narnia." Thus, it would have a ton more action, epic fantasy, and make most of the golden era pulps look slow. Yes, there is a slow part here, but that's mostly a horror element.

Of course, this book ends on a cliffhanger.

Thankfully, the next book is already out.  So get Somewhither today, and get the sequel immediately after it.

Review: Gemini Man

This one came out, and I have to tell you, it's about flipping time. I read this book months ago. I probably should have written up the review immediately, but I was more interested in finishing the bloody books that came in around them.

So, anyway, this is JD Cowan's book -- Gemini Man.

A steady paycheck. A simple job. Absolutely no contact with another human being.
The night shift at a science lab sounds like the break Matthew White has been waiting for. A steady paycheck. A simple job. Absolutely no contact with another human being.

It’s perfect.

But Matthew gets more than he bargained for when he accepts a different position with the company. A job that is highly paid – and highly bizarre. He is plunged into the terrible machinations of his new boss, Mrs. Stohl, and a sullen teenaged boy named Jason is along for the ride. The fact that Jason is practically his twin only makes it all creepier.

Dragged through a mirror into an alien dimension, Matthew is in way over his head. He should have known the job was too good to be true. To escape, Matthew and Jason must brave the wilds of this new universe and learn to control their new powers.

And hardest of all, Matthew must learn to be a hero.

Will they escape Mrs. Stohl’s terrible plans for them? Can they make it home to their world, or will they be trapped in the mirror dimension forever?

Join Matthew and Jason on their pulp superhero adventure. Read Gemini Warrior today!

This was was different in many respects from the previous Silver Empire superhero universe novels. The other books were largely character based. This is both character and world based. Which makes for an interesting shift in tone and execution.

Even the tone is markedly different at times from the other novels. There are a few sections in the opening where you can imagine it being from a black and white movie, where Edward G Robinson or Jimmy Cagney is spitting out dialogue in a solid, entertaining rant. It's one of the nice things about having a shared universe spread out among so many different authors. Even the descriptions of persons and actions seem very noir.

And when the description says that this is a pulp superhero adventure, this is less the Shadow, and more Flash Gordon. We even have an evil emperor who has magic powers (come now, Ming could walk through fire, and the "science" was more magic than anything else), as well as other super powered lackeys to do his bidding. And much of the villains look like they utilize a combination of mad science and magic in order to wield unearthly forces at their command.

... And yes, I did recently watch the complete Buster Crabbe Flash Gordon serials. Why do you ask?

As for our characters ... When we meet heroes Jason and Matthew, it's fun watching the inevitable train wreck coming their way. One of the opening scenes involve locking the two of them in a room together so they can get to know each other. We soon find that while they are of similar temperament, most of their opinions are diametrically opposed to each other.

I'm looking at the note I made on the Kindle edition. "We're going to link these two at the hip, aren't we?" Yes, yes we are. And we're going to give them the code names of Castor and Pollux, because JD is that literate, and superheros are just that subtle.

So we have another, well developed world, and evil dictator wielding magic to rule over the world. We have random encounters and fights with potential friends.

Over all, I enjoyed it. Do I think it's the best of the heroes thus far? Nope. I think that award goes to the next in the sequence. In any sane system, It would be a mid-range novel -- a solid setup to an interesting universe that I would get the next books in order to see where it ends up. But given that Amazon has turned a 3-star rating to "critical," (No, Amazon, I LIKED this book) I'm going to have to give this 4 out of five stars.

Get Gemini Man here, today. And enjoy.

Review: The War Revealed, by Karl Gallagher

I almost wish that The War Revealed came out this month.  That way, I could have voted for it for the Dragon Awards this year. I'm going to have to settle for The Lost War (reviewed yesterday).

Newman and Goldenrod survived landing in a monster-infested wilderness. Their group of historical reenactors no longer fears starvation. But can they control the magic powers people are developing? Discover how they were transported there? And stay safe from the orcs and dragons?

As noted in yesterday's review, this series is amazing.

In the first book, we saw the emergence of magic just beginning to settle in among the folks of the SCA troop transported to a fantasy world where magic is common ... and so are orcs. This book goes far deeper into the mechanics of magic. I'm trying to recall when the last time I saw magic being executed this practically. In the previous novel, a lot of time was spent on logistics and how things work. This novel centered around how magic worked. There's Chekov's gun, and then there's Checkov's SAW. There were even some uses of potential energy that read a little bit like old-school philosophy (IE: Ancient Philosophy). And some of it boils down to "Magic is weird."

But yeah, there's a lot of how things get done, only with magic. Call it "hard fantasy" if you must be picky, but it's interesting and readable for well over 30% of the book.

Then there were the elves. The mother. Flipping. Elves. Who are nasty, brutish and .... tall. The following exchange from the book sums it up rather nicely.

"It's an Elf."
"Don't call it that. We don't know anything about it. If you call it 'elf' just on its looks, you're making assumptions about its culture, morals, everything. That could bite us."
"I'm not going by his looks."
"What then?"
"The arrogance."

The book 1, the reader was made aware that our heroes were brought over to help with the orc problem -- the humans are the exterminators. Here, our heroes are told the "why," and then things become fun. Once again, the moral of the story is "Don't screw with the humans."

About a third of the book is focused on magic and how it works. Twenty percent is on the elves. And the rest of the novel focuses on and gears up to The Big Battle.

Also .. yeah, I'm going to make one or two more comparisons to John Ringo. Why? Because of lines like "The reply that sprang to mind was It's my job to be an @$$hole. But this wasn't the army, he wasn't a sergeant." Then there's an entire scene where someone is counting coup, only with orcs... because infantry, apparently. Yes, I still enjoy how easily Karl does character. Ignoring that some of the names are a tad on the nose ("Autocrat Sharpquill" is my favorite subtlety hammer), when Karl does character, he can do it in a few lines. I especially like the head of the camp, "King Ironhelm." ("I played Othello and Richard the Third in front of a thousand people! I can keep a f***ing poker face.")

And I do enjoy the lines. Karl even gets in good coinage. Like "I'm a Metatheist. I don't believe in God, but I believe I should."  I'm sorry, I just like the line.

And screaming "Cannae!" to order an encircling maneuver. That was fun.

I have one problem with The War Revealed .... there might not be a third book. So buy book one and two, read them, review them, and make sure I get a book 3, damn it.

To help that along, you may consider The Lost War for this years Dragon Award. I voted for it and a bunch of other stuff right here.  If you already have a slate picked out, clicking here will take you straight to the awards and voting in the nominations.

Review: The Lost War

When I was sitting next to Karl Gallagher at LibertyCon, he mentioned that Torchship was about his day job (yes, he is a rocket scientist), and that The Lost War was about his hobby.

It was supposed to be a weekend of costumed fun. Instead these medieval historical reenactors are flung into a wilderness by magic they don't understand. They must struggle to survive and deal with monsters who consider them prey . . . or worse.

Buckle up. This is going to be fun. This is my fantasy pick for best fantasy for the Dragon Awards this year. It is awesome, and you are going to like it. And if you don't, you're wrong.

Our main character is Newman Greenhorn -- and if you can't tell that he's a newbie at a gathering of the Society for Creative Anachronism, now you know. When his girlfriend brings him to the pagan circle on the first night, well, what's the worst that can happen?

This. This is the worst that can happen.

As the circle disbands, the entire camp has moved. The flora is different. The fauna are different. The stars are different. And there are three moons in the sky. The entire camp has been moved and the struggle to survive has begun. They need food. They need weapons. They need to know what threats are out there. And look up in the sky! It's a bird.... no, it's a plane.... crap, that's a dragon.

If you're thinking "SCA surviving in a fantasy landscape. Hmm, sounds like John Ringo's Council Wars".... that is a very superficial view of it. Let's put it this way, when I read Karl's Torchship trilogy, I said in a review "Well, if David Weber ever needs help finishing Honor Harrington, maybe he should take to Karl."

Having topped David Weber, Karl has apparently decided to top John Ringo. And I don't even mean the Council Wars. Because there is a very specific reason that Newman and the camp have been brought over to this new world. The world has a problem, and the humans are to be the pest control. Thank you, rotten, mutha-bleepin elves. (Yes, think Posleen. Only worse).

However, the plot is not what got me started on thinking about John Ringo. There is so much readable logistics in this book, it's amazing. There is a ton of effort put in on how things get done -- are the flora safe? Are the Fauna safe? The amateur astronomer who confirms, "Yes, the stars are different. We are not in Kansas anymore, Toto." "Oh look, here are piles of bones, we can deduce that we aren't the only hunters out here." There are considerations about medicines, hygiene, resource consumption, resource allocation, down to "How do we make soap?" and the question of law enforcement. Karl does a great job of setting up the situation, the variations of reactions to the setting, the governing of the new world -- both official and unofficial. You can see how it feels a bit like a Ringo novel, as he's one of the few I can think of who can recreate and rebuild an entire society that completely.

Amateurs study tactics. Karl's a professional.

Also, I dare you to find someone else who will deal with fantasy parasitology, microbiology and serology.

AND EVERY LAST MINUTE OF IT WAS EASILY READABLE AND ENJOYABLE. Unlike most geniuses, Karl writes plainly and easily without dumbing it down.

The character of Newman himself is ... a lot of military guys with two brain cells to rub together. (Which seems to be most of them -- I've only met one or two I wouldn't trust to breath into a paper bag.) Down to one section of "I'm more comfortable with strangers trying to kill me in the wild than dealing with protocol for nobility. Your excellency."

It was perfect. Down to the placement of the period.

There is a lot of easy character development. At least one character became my favorite in a one-page description (look for the character of "Burnout." I suspect she is a PA).

And then human beings start developing magical powers, and we have SCA X-Men.

This leads to some interesting moments, including several instances where the characters make a deduction, follow through on the deduction, and it is apparent to the reader what is going on -- and it is AT NO POINT SPELLED OUT FOR THE READER. Because Karl figures that the reader also has two brain cells to rub together. And he's right. I didn't have to be told what was going on ... in fact, I had to double back to make certain that Karl didn't spell it out. It's great writing.

And it's so nice when a character calls out "Thalassa!" and I know what the bleep he's talking about.

I have only one problem with the book -- no chapters. The novel is more or less one continuous work. Luckily, I read quickly, so I didn't have to lose TOO much sleep.

Anyway, as I said, a great book, brilliantly executed, and I've already finished books 1 and 2 this weekend. I hope to have the sequel reviewed by tomorrow. I'm hoping there's a book 3.

Buy book 1, The Lost War, here.

It is my pick for the Dragon Awards -- to see what else I've nominated, click here.

To go straight to voting for the Dragon Awards, without looking at anyone else's thoughts.that would be here.

NEW RELEASE: City of shadows.

City of Shadows is live and only $.99 on Amazon right now.

London is alive with the sound of shadows.
When Tommy Nolan was sent abroad to avoid being made a saint too soon, he thought he'd be a glorified tourist. But when an impossible prehistoric artifact the Vatican is looking at is stolen from the British Museum, they do the first thing that comes to mind -- they call the cops.

But Tommy is soon convinced that the artifact is more than it seems. The crime scene looks like a war zone. The owners of the stolen merchandise eye him with suspicion. His new partner has a shady, mysterious past. The police are ready to arrest him. The city itself seems primed to explode.

Worst of all, the darkness itself is closing in on Tommy, the city, and everyone who lives there.

But Tommy isn't one to curse the darkness. The darkness curses him.

But while I think about it, the entire series is $.99 this week. This means the other three books are on sale right now. Click here if you haven't gotten them already.

And, as you wait for the books to download to your Kindle, please join the discussion about the Dragon Awards. I've got the latest post updated and ready to go, and I seriously want to hear from you and your thoughts on what you enjoyed..

War Demons

The Devil went down to Georgia. He was looking for a soul to steal.

And this time, he isn't coming with a violin.

Welcome to War Demons, by Russell Newquist.**

When he came home, so did they...

Driven by vengeance, Michael Alexander enlisted in the Army the day after 9/11. Five years later, disillusioned and broken by the horrors he witnessed in Afghanistan, Michael returns home to Georgia seeking to begin a new life. But he didn't come alone. Something evil followed him, and it's leaving a path of destruction in its wake.

The police are powerless. The Army has written Michael off. Left to face down a malevolent creature first encountered in the mountains of Afghanistan, he'll rely on his training, a homeless prophet, and estranged family members from a love lost...

But none of them expected the dragon.

Jim Butcher's Harry Dresden collides with Larry Correia's Monster Hunter International in this supernatural thriller that goes straight to Hell!

That tag at the end isn't bluster. It's fairly accurate. Personally, I think War Demons leans more on the MHI than the Harry Dresden. So much so that I'm willing to say up front that I would not be surprised if Russell ends up authoring an MHI spinoff novel. No, I'm not exaggerating. This is a story that could have been mistaken for a Monster Hunter International novel if Larry Correia used prayer as a weapon more often. But I will admit, there is a TON of Dresden-level action.

Let's back up a step.

Chapter one opens up with a swordfight with a demon, and ends with dropping a daisy cutter on it.

That irritated the sucker a little.

Fast forward a few years to our hero, Michael Alexander, who Jack Ryaned out of the military when his helicopter crashed. He and his buddy hid in a cave .... only do discover something in the cave that was colder than the dark and hungry.

When Michael returns to Georgia, the thing that haunted him in the sandbox follows...

Ahem, "The Devil went down to Georgia...."

But when Michael starts to see his dead friend stalking him in the shadows, well, it's just some PTSD demons. Nothing to worry about, right?

Yeesh. When this guy is haunted by his past, he takes it literally.

The fun continues as the circle of crazy threatens to suck in the entire state. Black Ops commandos, Vatican operatives, a billionaire prepper (seriously, don't mess with the billionaire prepper), a moment of "I wanna bring the flamethrower" that I really believe (Down to "We got it from the Bureau of Land Management"). He gathers the magnificent seven, mounts up, and "We're gonna save the damsel from the dragon"....

Aaaaannnnnddddd it's only the halfway mark. Which made me wonder how the bloody blue Hell the rest of the book was going to go.

That was pretty much the point where things got worse, complete with a villain you really just want to run through with a stake, cut its head off and burn the body ... maybe in that order. It was such a deliciously evil sucker.

And then he had a couple of blackhawks and Apache attack helicopters fight a dragon.

And, it being Georgia, it ends at a football stadium.

Because of course it does. It's Georgia.

Honestly, War Demons was solidly authored and put together. 11% into the book, he's established most of the characters we're going to see throughout the novel, including the villains. Yes, all of them. What? You thought just a demon was going to be enough? Nah. We're going to have golems and vampires and zombies and warlocks and Jihadis, oh my. (Or, as I thought of it as I read it, "terrorists and demons? Challenge accepted.")  Newquist also does a great job of sprinkling the back story throughout the novel.

It's got a nice sense of humor. Up to and including a spook who picks his aliases out of a liquor cabinet.

But as I said at the start, the tag line for this novel is no boast. The action is MHI at its most gonzo (otherwise known as Harry Dresden on a day that ends in Y). The atomospherics top even F. Paul Wilson's The Keep (book, not movie).

Here's the short version: get War Demons. If you like Urban Fantasy, or books with a Soutern atmosphere, or military UF, Larry Correia or Jim Butcher novels, you're going to enjoy War Demons.

And, while you're at it, you might want to pick up Hell Spawn and Death Cult from Amazon, which are all in the same vein.

**For those people who are wondering, yes, Russell is my publisher at Silver Empire. Don't think that influenced my review. Mainly because if I thought it sucked, I wouldn't mention it here, or ever again. I'm actually worried that since it took so damn long for me to review this one, someone is going to think I didn't like it. In this case, no, I got a free copy of this book for review on e-ARC, and then my Kindle died.

LOVE AT FIRST BITE SALE, FOUR BOOKS, $10

So, just to make things clear, starting from 12AM (PDT) Wed Oct 24, through 11PM (PDT) Sun Oct 28th, the complete Love at First Bite series will be on sale.

The entire series will be only $10.

If you'd like, the breakdown is as follows...

• Honor at Stake (book 1) $0.99
• Demons are Forever (book 2) $1.99
• Live and Let Bite (book 3) $2.99
• Good to the Last Drop (book 4) $3.99

So, the whole thing adds up to $10

So if you're new here, and would like to check out my work before Hell Spawn arrives ....

Enjoy Love at First Bite.

Review: The Hidden Truth and A Rambling Wreck

On 9-11, the capitol was burning, the white house destroyed. The newly sworn in President Lieberman swore to get the terrorists and their Saudi backers. At least the World Trade Center is still standing.


Welcome to the alternate history of Hans Schantz's The Hidden Truth.

In book 1, our hero, Peter Burdell, trips over an obscure fact: three historic deaths in electromagnetism that happened before their time. Conspiracy? Maybe? But that would require modern technology and knowledge to sway the course of history...

So in A Rambling Wreck, this leads to a 400 year old (minimum) conspiracy that spreads through government, science and academia.

Part of the problem with reviewing one book at a time is that, here, they're really one continuous novel. We follow Peter as he follows an obscure piece of historical trivia that doesn't jive with other sources of history, and then he goes right down the rabbit hole. The end result is that these books are one part alternate history, one part paranoid political thriller. Usually, paranoid thrillers are a turn-off for me, since they tend to be exhausting. Here, though, it feels more like Person of Interest. It's a little paranoid. With touches of the FISA memo sprinkled in. (And Hans wrote this over a year ago, so, worry about his prescience.)

It's a fun series. There are parts that drag, but not many. Most of the slow bits are highly informative and interesting. You get to learn stuff. This one is politics and science heavy. The history here is the easy part. The politics is merely the terrifying part.

Foucault's Pendulum, that masterpiece of Umberto Eco (wherein he created Dan Brown as a fictional character long before anyone had ever heard of him) took every paranoid conspiracy theory, fed them into a computer, and the computer tied them together into something apocalyptic.

Hans has taken over a hundred years of historical facts and made a conspiracy that will scare the heck out of me for a long while.

This is why I want to nominated the sequel to  The Hidden Truth, A Rambling Wreck, for this year's Dragon Award for Alternate History.

If you don't have your ballot filled out already (either IRL or in your head,) here's my list. It includes the lists of other people, so there are options. Just remember to vote.

The Planetary Awards are coming to a close

The Planetary Awards

Please remember that this one is still here, and all votes must be in by the end of April

This one is a book blogger's award. They have two categories: short and long. Click on this link for the instructions on how to vote from your blog onto their award.

But yeah, if you have a blog and write about books, knock yourselves out.

....  I should probably vote for this as well. Oops.


It's going to be interesting. I don't know an awful lot about the award. And, since the book was pulled for rerelease by Silver Empire, campaigning would be odd. I don't think my publisher would appreciate me handing out ARCs of the book before he gets to edit a new version.

Oh, and while I think about it, I'm also up against Nick Cole and Robert Kroese. So, I'm going to need all the help I can get.

So, the Planetary Awards are in for the best SFF stories of 2017.  Anyone who has a blog, podcast, or YouTube account can vote. 

Which is most of the people I know, come to think of it.

The people involved are....

Short Stories / Novellas

• “Acadie” by Dave Hutchinson
• “The Bitten Body” by AC Spahn
• “Death on the Moon” by Spencer Hart, found in Cirsova issue #6
• “The First American” by Schuyler Hernstrom, found in Cirsova issue #5
• “The Pilot” by Andrew Mayne, found in Predator: If It Bleeds
• “Trouble in an Hourglass” by Jody Lynn Nye, found in Straight Outta Tombstone

My first thought is Jody, easily. But Cirsova has got a lot of people backing them. So start flipping coins.

Novels

• “Age of Assassins” by RJ Barker
• “Good to the Last Drop” by Declan Finn
• “The Guns Above” by Robyn Bennis
• “Kings of the Wyld” by Nicholas Eames
• “Legionnaire” by Jason Anspach and Nick Cole
• “Out of the Soylent Planet” by Robert Kroese
• “The Rogue Prince” by Lindsay Buroker

Do I have to actually say that I'd like to vote for myself and Good to the Last Drop? I think "Planetary Award Winner" looks just as nice as "Dragon Award Nominated series."

Not that I think I have a hope in heck. Between Cole and Anspach on one end, and Kroese on the other, I'm relatively cooked. In fact, if I'm actually not allowed to vote for myself, Robert Kroese is my bet. Out of the Soylent Planet is the third book in the Rex Nihilo series, so yeah, I'll be happy if it wins.

Of course, I hear about the nomination the day after the novel is pulled from shelves to prep for the Silver Empire rerelease. That's just timing. But hey, it's something to put on the new cover.

How to vote:

If you've already nominated something, you don’t need to cast a vote. It's fairly obvious who you're voting for. You can change your vote in the comments section on their webpage.

However, if you haven't nominated anything, just vote on your blog, podcast, or YouTube channel. Then, leave a comment on their page so they know about the vote. You get one vote for best short story and one for best novel, but you don’t have to use both votes if you’re only interested in one category.

The voting deadline is April 30th, 11:59PM US Pacific time.

If you have a book blog, time to vote. If you don't have a book blog ... now might be the time to start one.

Why Catholic Vampires?

Love at First Bite is my My Dragon Award Nominated series. Usually, my elevator pitch is "Traditional Vampires that integrate free will into the mythology, resulting in a unique end result."

What I don't say is that by "Traditional Vampires that integrate free will," I mean "Catholic Vampires."

This is in part because, as one person replied: Weren't Vampires always Catholic?

There's a point there. In the original mythology that I can recall, Vampires weren't repelled by a cross, but to the crucifix. They reacted to a consecrated host.

But they were also automatically evil. And that was the part I drew the line at. How did that make any sense?

In Dracula, the novel, Vlad Tempes was never considered a nice guy. And I'm certain that Stoker's history wasn't exactly half as detailed as ours would be today. For Stoker, Dracula was probably evil even before he was a vampire. When Lucy was turned, she could be little more than a feral dog, overwhelmed by urges and appetites she'd never had before. All easily explained.

But after a while, once you get into other vampires, why would all of them in fiction become automatically evil? Doesn't that subvert free will? Unless you go for the Buffy solution, which was that all vampires were soulless, and the soul was replaced with a carbon copy of a demon. Basically, people were the skin suits that a demon wore. They drank blood as a perverted mockery of the Eucharist, and that's that.

But otherwise, it's generally unexplained. I don't even remember Larry's Monster Hunter International series addressing it, really. It was just "Vampires are evil, they don't sparkle, just kill the f**kers." (Though if anyone has a better recollection, let me know.)

My vampires at the very least needed to address free will.

Which becomes a problem. How can I have people become vampires, and then automatically afflicted by holy artifacts? Unless I go the "demon wearing a skin suit" route, it doesn't make much sense.

But what if vampires, like people, are formed by their actions?

Catholic theology states that a resurrected body is a body that is perfectly controlled by the soul. So, the more actions one makes, the more the vampire is formed, and the closer body and soul comes together. The more evil actions one commit, the vampire becomes more powerful, but is also more afflicted by religious artifacts.

Anyone who is "good" is something different.

Here's yet another tenant of Catholicism that ended up in the novel: Aristotle. Yes, the vampires are based around Catholic philosophy because the Church still uses Aristotle. "Actions form the person" is straight out of his Ethics. RPGs also use a similar system (the one I'm familiar with is Knights of the Old Republic).

Now, even under this model, I would not, and will not argue for being just "people with fangs." I submit that when you take a person, remove all sense of personal consequences from their life, and give them the powers of a vampire, then they are not "people with fangs," it's a grave temptation to become a serial killer with fangs. One monster or another, there's very little difference except in scale and scope.

Keep in mind, I'm not saying "people are naturally evil." I'd say at least half of my vampires are just folk who would like to survive and move along. Wearing a cross is gonna hurt, unless they go to frequent confessions, because even venial sins are going to mount up after a while.

And yes, I want redemption to be a possibility. Why? In part because I sometimes write bad guys that I like enough to want to redeem. They're not pure evil, they just try to be. Also, hell, if you're still on the planet Earth, and not in Hell, I'm fully convinced that Heaven continue to try to catch sinners until the last possible moment. When you consider the number of Catholic saints who used to be schmucks, redemption will sneak into my series eventually.

Keep in mind, this still circles back to the "actions maketh the man" aspect. Evil people can still do good things -- it's rare, but it happens. Granted, some of the most evil pricks on Earth have ironic "virtues" that are comedically small in comparison to their crimes, but some don't even have that much. I don't recall anyone trying to spin Stalin as having a single quality that made him look like anything less than a total prick, while Hitler was a vegetarian who painted flowers.

Granted, the levels of evil I'm dealing with ... well, let's just say that their isn't a LOT of redemption from the antagonists. I may have redeemed two vampire antagonists over the course of the series.

But then again, look at my protagonists, will you? There's Marco ... who's his own type of dark. There's Amanda, who had to participate in things that she still thinks about sometimes. Let's not even discuss Rory, shall we?

Okay, I know what you're thinking: That's all very nice, but how do I do this as a "neutral" thing? How do I leave Free Will while having an obviously supernatural problem? Well, vampirism is transmitted by blood-to-blood contact, so it's a blood born virus. We know the vector.

Obviously, it must be a supernatural virus, transmitted from human / supernatural contact.

In Honor at Stake, I suggested Nephilim were the origin, but I've kept it vague, if only because I don't have any vampires that old to confirm it, nor is there anyone kicking around who has that much history.

If I ever continue the world, I'm going to have to dive into the virology more. After all, vampires have worked with governments -- Nazis, Soviets-- so we know there were experiments. I'm just never going to do those stories, because I suspect it's going to look like Wolfenstein or Hellboy if I do that.

One of the few things I've spelled out is one of the quirks of viruses: most of them try to not kill the host. In fact, if I treat vampirism as being a disease, it's actually a symbiotic relationship, as it keeps the host alive. Which means it would act like it. There are some viruses that actually aid the host by providing food (for example, one real life avian virus that encourages bugs to climb to higher altitude, making it easy for the birds to eat them).

And finally, the best reason I have for doing Catholic vampires ...

I'm Catholic.

Duh.

See if anyone else gets redeemed in the climactic conclusion to the series, with Good to the Last Drop. Or, if you're new here and haven't read the series yet,  click here to get the entire Love at First Bite cycle.

Hollywood Screw Ups

When Hollywood adapts a novel to a film, the average is to bet on the adaptation SUCKING. Lord of the Rings is an outlier, and Harry Potter was mostly faithful because they didn't want to get torn apart by a legion of angry ten year olds.

But mostly, you're better off just running. The Relic, Shooter (the film), The Bourne Identity (the films were so two dimensional) and the list goes on.

Now what fresh hell has been unleashed on us?

I give you.... Disney.

There's Cars 3 .... because everyone loved one and two so much (hint: It's the only Pixar film I can't find anyone to say a nice word about)

Because they're bringing back the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise.

Really? The abomination of the second and third films weren't enough for you? And no, you couldn't drag me to see any of the films after that. You would literally have to pay me to review that drek. I mean literally. If I can get an offer, I'll start a kickstarter. I'll do a review.  And, apparently, Orlando Bloom's career sucks so badly right now, he's been dragged back into this film. Either that, or the franchise has been going downhill so badly that they had to back up the dump truck filled with money to pay his salary.

Next, they're doing a live action Mulan....

Yes. Because every review of Beauty and the Beast I've seen from people I trust has been less than positive -- or, at best, showed me that, yes, this was a totally unnecessary remake. They even made it with A LEAD ACTRESS WHO CAN'T SING. So now we're going to have yet another unnecessary remake.

Yay.

And then we're going to have a sequel .... to Mary Poppins. Yes, you heard, Mary, flipping, Poppins. The genius title? Mary Poppins Returns.  Really? It took fifty years to think up this title?

And who do you get to replace Julie Andrews?

The film stars Emily Blunt as Mary Poppins,

Yeah. This is Emily Blunt

I suspect that her choice was based on the type of drugs the casting guy was on.

And the plot? Oh, you're going to love this one. Remember Mary Poppins right? A distant father hires a nanny to deal with his troublesome kids. Hilarity ensues.

This one?

Set 25 years after the original film, and taking inspiration from later books in the Mary Poppins series, the film will see Mary Poppins revisiting the Banks family after they suffer a family tragedy.

The film opens Christmas Day 2018.

Family tragedy! A surefire Christmas film.

"Oh, but it's based off of later books!"

If you'll turn your attention to this corner, you will see a brief synopsis of each book in the series. You will note that there is nothing that even remotely resembles a tragedy.

So, shut up, Disney.


Finally, worst of all, they are making (read: they will screw up) A Wrinkle in Time. 

A Wrinkle ... in Time.

A WRINKLE IN TIME!? ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

SCREW YOU DISNEY! MAY YOUR PARKS BE SWALLOWED UP AND FALL INTO THE NINTH LEVEL OF HELL.

Why do I say that? Because the author, Madeleine L'Engle basically wrote a YA novel that is essentially Christian...

Remember the last time they did one of those? Oh yeah, Narnia.

This is going to suck.

Seriously. Go to Hell, Disney. Straight to Hell.

Here, have some books that are more cinematic than most Hollywood films lately.

And they're cheaper than a movie ticket.

The Love at First Bite series.